put on the red light
by Missy Jade
Summary: before he's realized it's started, there's running in the night ' monroenick, canon through 1x13


_monroe/nick, pg-13, ~1000_  
_canon through 1x13  
an: yes title is from the police song. i don't even care.  
_

* * *

Before he's realized it's started, there's running in the night.

And the heavy feeling in his gut isn't the old wild rush that still pulls at him even now, and that disturbs him so much more in the moment before he remembers why he should be disturbed—

Monroe wakes up then with his pillow mashed over his face and his jaw aching and the sky's still dark outside.

His brain's a haze, and he's impossibly tired, and he rolls around under his sheets until he gives up.

Breakfast is oatmeal and coffee milked down (because his blood is already pounding).

* * *

His efforts to keep Nick out of his daily life prove futile all too quickly.

The detective is a constant in it almost immediately, and it's a sudden change that should be jarring.

But Nick brings him meals from one place or another when he visits (unless it's close to dinnertime and then he doesn't, and somehow Monroe has already cooked enough even though he never plans to and usually only cooks for one) and he already seems to know what Monroe likes to eat instead of just tolerating as needed nourishment, and it's irrational when the man isn't even making an effort to get to know him.

Monroe blames the Grimm-ness, or the detective-ness, and knows that Nick _really_hates radishes.

* * *

It takes too long to realize he's being chased.

The realization comes only slowly on his part, and then he forgets that he hadn't known this.

Because his lungs are burning, have started to ache like he's been holding his breath too long without meaning to, but he's panting as he rushes through the undergrowth, and the wild inside him feels different now.

Awareness strings tighter as he hears the other figure gain sudden speed and he twists off into the dark with a jolt of some bizarre mix of nervousness and relief, takes off more desperately even though he isn't trying to lose him—

There are dim fragments surfacing sometimes now, and the ache is close to painful.

He runs, and runs, and when he turns without thinking, it's to rush back at the other, to chase instead of flee—

Monroe drags himself awake, body still aching even after he takes his morning shower only to let the hot water bleed to cold, and carefully eats his oatmeal while foregoing the coffee completely.

Then he devours first a half of a grapefruit and then the rest of it, and then goes after a plum.

* * *

Nick is so good at acting like Monroe is at his beck and call that Monroe finds it hard to remember he isn't.

Because mornings and nights, Tuesdays and Fridays, whether Monroe has a previous appointment or would just like a day not doing much of anything except for fixing a couple of the clocks or even when Nick is sick and somehow that last one upsets Monroe more than the ones before it—

"You need a new car," Nick informs him like he's revolted by everything but especially the little car, and looks a little like he'd like someone to cut _his_head off as he presses fingers into his eyes.

"You need to do this later," Monroe retorts, and tired eyes cut to him with the irritation felt only by someone too sick to think of anything really impressive to throw back in response.

And Monroe can see the sharp lines of his face in the barely-there light, and his breathing is thin.

Oddly sure of himself and somehow too irritated to worry very much anyway, Monroe reaches out to pick up the little paper bag that Nick had pushed away a few minutes before and drops it unceremoniously into the Grimm's lap. He doesn't say anything, doesn't need to, and he can almost feel the air vibrating next to him in silent refusal.

Monroe keeps driving, and he remembers antiseptic and white walls and Nick so steel-eyed in the hospital bed despite the terror that left his scent thick (and that smell usually thrills the deeper parts of him but there's a edge to the smell of Nick's fear that scrapes against his nerves, that leaves him restless and oddly irritated).

After a moment:

"They taste disgusting," Nick tells him, frighteningly reminiscent of an angry ten-year-old, but unwraps one Ricola and pops it into his mouth before shoving the bag back between them as if he hasn't just admitted defeat.

Monroe accepts Nick's surrender without further comment, and continues down the road to the cemetery.

* * *

There is a rush of movement almost as soon as he's turned, an impact against his body, and he digs fingers into Nick's arms as he's shoved back, drags the other man down to the ground after him. Pain spikes up his back but he's twisting up anyway, reaching to grab the back of Nick's head, pull him closer.

A mouth opens against his, the force in the kiss sudden and possessive as fingers twitch under his shirt to stroke his skin clumsily, as a knee knocks against his and Nick's body stretches over him.

There's no lack of control in this, no hint of the old uncertainty between one ragged breath and the next, and he bites with a control that's never been this easy at the corner of Nick's mouth, groans a little as the contact is returned—

Some frightened animal screams far in the distance, an unnatural noise that doesn't belong here, that doesn't make sense and is so at odds with the pleasure pooling inside him that Monroe is half falling out of bed before he's even aware of it and reaching for the phone, chest tight and breathing wild—

Monroe lifts the phone to check the name (and he doesn't need to) and finds NICK lit up on the screen.

The word is a little blurry, the way his hand is shaking—

For a long time Monroe stares down at his phone in his hand, body feeling heavy.

In the dark, his clock is ticking, the sound clear between one ring and the next—

He tastes flesh, heat, and this hunger is a new weight inside, a foreign one somehow as natural as breathing.

Another ring—

His thumb jerks, presses flat and steady against the key as Monroe answers Nick's call in the middle of the night.


End file.
